


And the Sky Opened Up

by Nautilusopus



Series: The Number I [4]
Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, Conditioning, Deleted Scene, Found Families, Gen, Human Experimentation, Implied/Referenced Torture, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Side Story, Strong Feelings About Shitty Snack Food, Touch-Starved, does this count as a prequel? sure why not, hopefully can be read independently of The Number I if I've done my job right, local moron self-loathes more at ten, post-Lifestream scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 03:50:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18984676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nautilusopus/pseuds/Nautilusopus
Summary: Aboard the Highwind, truly awake for the first time in months, Cloud finally gets a chance to think. A lot of things start catching up to him.





	And the Sky Opened Up

**Author's Note:**

> "Hey Squid what the fuck this isn't a chapter"
> 
> This was written months in advance and was originally going to be part of chapter 37. However, it was ultimately cut because 1) it got waaaaaaaaaaay too long and 2) fucked with the pacing of the original transitions. But I didn't want to just scrap it given it's technically a unique and semi-significant character moment and not an alternate take of the same scene, so I cleaned it up a little and now it's a "bonus feature". And most definitely not another buffer fic because I started writing 39 and 40 and have finished neither of them and need to buy myself another week due to bad time management. Whoops!
> 
> Thanks to death-rebirth-senshi for beta'ing on short notice. 
> 
> Man watch this thing just be fuckin riddled with typos

A lot of things made sense now, even things Cloud hadn't considered made no sense before.

He understood, obviously, why there were things he didn't know that he should have, and things he knew that he couldn't possibly have. He understood why, for the first few weeks or so, nearly everything he'd eaten had made him violently ill until they had figured out his stomach couldn't handle anything heavier than broth. He understood the voices that weren't voices, muttering away in the back of his head. He understood the serial number engraved into his wrist, and why looking at it filled him with equal parts deep revulsion and warm comfort. He understood the ache in his chest, and how it felt as though there were a hot iron being pressed into his ribs whenever he went too close to a natural mako spring. He understood why Tifa had said the things she'd said, did the things she'd done. He understood why it mattered when people said his name. He understood why it meant so much when Barret had touched his shoulder.

Barret was doing it right now, too, and he finally understood.

Cloud picked at a bit of dried gum on the conference table, still shivering slightly as he recovered from his trip through the Lifestream, Barret keeping him upright in his chair as his vision went in and out of focus.

"That's it then, isn't it?" said Nanaki, who had climbed up onto the table for a closer look, pressing his nose against a spot on Cloud's chest where Hojo had implanted the white materia when he’d been showing progress before declaring it useless, as well as the person attached to the ribcage surrounding it. "That's the materia they kept talking about in the notes. Grandpa said it was lost years ago."

"Shinra was probably sitting on that thing for years," said Barret. "That's supposed to help us?"

Cloud shook his head. "Maybe. I've had it this whole time, and I still can't trace any spell from it." If he concentrated very hard, he could barely make out the faint tug all materia offered when acting as a conduit. It may as well have just been glass otherwise. "Sephiroth must not have realised I'd had it, or he would've taken it from me at the Northern Crater. We finally know something he doesn't."

"Two things," said Jessie, tensing up as Cloud looked at her. People still weren't quite used to his eyes. On top of the slitted pupils, they were glowing brighter than ever as he waited for the last of the mako poisoning to subside. "What about Jenova? If he can use you, maybe you can use him."

Cloud shrugged. It was one thing to listen but he couldn't see himself lasting against Jenova long enough to actually force someone to do something. But... it was easier. There was somewhere -- someone to return to now. He was real. He was real and himself and these people wanted him here...

He took a deep breath and blinked the stars out of his eyes, reluctantly pulling himself away from the weight of Barret's hand.

"Don't think you should be up and about just yet," warned Barret.

"Just gonna get something to eat," said Cloud. "Don't think you want me throwing it up on you this time." His legs were still a bit shaky from recently coming out of another vegetative state, but there was a strange sort of excitement simmering in his chest that made him keep putting one foot in front of the other.

He wasn't even sure what he was hopeful about. Everything was objectively pretty bleak, all things considered. Meteor loomed in the sky. The death toll was rising every day as Weapons continued to ravage cities and towns. Sephiroth had torn through a few himself prior to that, looking for the last Cetra relic that would potentially, if they were very lucky, prove to be his undoing. Hojo... well...

But maybe he didn't care if things were only going to get worse. It also didn't feel like they were going to get any better, either. In a roundabout way, he'd done what he wanted to do already. Even if, at the same time, that meant he was doing absolutely nothing, and that was the point?

He felt happy.

When was the last time he'd actually felt happy?

He had to turn around when he realised he'd gotten lost in his thoughts long enough to overshoot the mess hall. The Highwind was enormous, and even with the tour Cid had provided he still found himself getting lost. Still, even that had improved. It was as though a fog he hadn't even realised had been there was suddenly lifted. Everything was clearer somehow -- felt solid in a way it hadn't since... he wasn't sure when. Maybe ever.

He could have just been imagining that part, though. Or it could have been him finally shaking off the last of the mako poisoning. Who even knew what was wrong with him at this point? At least they'd finally figured out how to fix it.

He found Tifa leaning against the metal piping that ran throughout the entire ship, working her way through a jar of preserved hot peppers with a spoon. Yuffie was a few feet away, bent over the sink with her eyes firmly shut.

"Should you be walking?" asked Tifa through a mouthful of habaneros.

"Should you be eating those like that?" he replied, his nose burning slightly from the smell alone.

Tifa swallowed and shrugged. "Someone's gotta eat them. When the others stole this thing it was stocked for a whole battalion. Now it's just us, plus four or five guys from engineering and another pilot that Cid convinced to defect." She popped another spoonful of peppers in her mouth. "Got some leftovers in the walk-in behind Yuffie," she said between bites."I'll grab you something in a sec."

"I can --" But before Cloud could finish, she'd already screwed the lid back onto the jar and disappeared around the corner. Oh well.

"What's up with you?" he asked Yuffie, stumbling over to the sink and leaning against the counter, waiting for his head to clear. He probably _shouldn't_ be walking.

"Don't make me talk," she groaned. "Gonna ralph."

"In the sink?"

Yuffie gave him the finger in response and curled up further over the metal lip of the drain. Cloud pulled himself up onto the counter and sat there with a quiet groan.

A thought came over him, then -- one that, on instinct, he began to fight down as he remembered it wasn't allowed. They'd driven that message into him until he'd grasped it perfectly after the third punishment, and it _wasn't allowed_ \--

But... it was, wasn't it? They couldn't... there was nothing they could do to him here. Just because he remembered the rules, that didn't mean they would come back.

He raised a barely shaking hand, and, after a moment of hesitation, rested it on Yuffie's back.

He flinched, expecting her to jerk away, to carve another lesson into his flesh somewhere until he learned to do better -- but instead she just looked at him in shock.

"I --" Cloud swallowed, heart thundering in his chest. There was nothing they could do to him anymore, but -- he knew now, he knew it wasn't allowed, but he couldn't make himself take his hand away, or run, or apologise. He was rooted to the spot, even as he told himself that it was fine, he was out now, it was fine...

"...Thanks, Cloud," said Yuffie through the noise in his head, and leaned back over the sink.

"...I used to get motion-sick a lot," he said slowly. "I heard... I just read people do this. I can stop, though, if it -- if it doesn't actually help."

"Nah, it's pretty nice," she replied. Then she frowned and looked back up at him. "You running a fever or something? Your hands are freakishly warm."

"It's the mako, I think," said Cloud, immediately jerking his hand away."Baseline for Soldiers is 38 or 39 degrees." He internally winced. "I mean -- for..."

"Excuse me, did I say to stop?" said Yuffie, clearly unconcerned with the blunder he thought she'd be. "Put your hand back, you're like a hot water bottle."

"Sorry." He quickly returned to rubbing her back, looking away when she began to dry heave. Tifa was there in front of him, setting a pile of four or five snack rolls with blueberries baked into them beside him before offering him one. Cloud stared at it.

"You'd bring these to school every now and then," she explained. "Your mother made them, I think. You must've really liked them."

"...I don't remember," said Cloud, looking away again. "I'm sorry."

"Just take it slow, alright?" she said. "Even if you don't remember... I'm glad to have you back."

Cloud nodded stiffly as Yuffie finished rinsing her mouth (and the sink) out behind him.

"I'll try not to go anywhere," he said. He accepted the roll from her with his free hand and took a bite.

No sudden recollections came to him, which was fair enough. He'd already done more than his share of that in the Lifestream. It just tasted really good.

"That week in Cosmo Canyon, when you were out messing around with Barret," said Yuffie, "she tried making them. No blueberries out in the desert, though. We had to use luchile nuts instead."

He remembered, briefly, coming back in to find Yuffie holding some crumbling nutcake in one hand, rummaging through old boxes for materia in the other. He wondered what the roll he was eating right now would have tasted like fresh from the oven, tacky and warm and smelling just a little bit like eggs.

But -- he wasn't supposed to. He wasn't supposed to, food wasn't for specimens. He remembered going years and years, longing for it before gradually forgetting what it was like to eat altogether. He realised he didn't even know what to expect the roll to taste like until she'd given it to him, besides sweet.

He wasn't supposed to, and here they were giving him food, the alternating panic and thrill of doing something he wasn't supposed to running through him, electricity beneath his skin with every bite, and it was -- it was so good. Food was so good, he'd forgotten what it was like, to not have food, and he'd touched Yuffie, and Barret had touched him, and he was wearing clothes somewhere warm even though they _knew_ what he was, knew he'd failed, that he'd never made Soldier, that he'd ruined everything, and they still...

Struggling to remember what onion rings and fresh apples and bread tasted like, and Tifa, making dinner for them all at Seventh Heaven, even as he managed to piss off and belittle everyone at the table. Cid, making enough room for him in the tiny bed in the hotel room they'd rented for the night, and how it felt to lay on bare concrete, unwashed and in pain and aching to be able to touch something warm. Jessie, her hand on his face after wiping off soot, and screaming himself hoarse for hours on end from pain, and because he would have given anything, everything -- would have happily died just for one smile, one kind word, one single glimpse of the sky, and how even that had seemed like some impossible dream, too painful to even think about after a while.

He'd been ungrateful. He was disgusted -- sickened, with how ungrateful he'd been, not realising how all of it could be gone, how lucky he was to have it, that he was here and alive and himself, Cloud, his own name. And food tasted good, like he'd imagined it to, and they were giving it to him, and he'd been eating it all this time, and there was so much of it...

He was still silently crying by the time he stopped eating, eyes fixed on a stain on the floor. He hadn't even noticed he'd taken his hand off Yuffie's back until her hand was on his.

He'd been right. This did help.

"Thank you," was all he managed to say, as Tifa shoved the remaining buns off to the side. She took a seat next to him, lacing her fingers through his. "Thank you. I --"

He was crying in front of an audience. "Soldier First Class" Cloud Strife, actually crying, and they were watching, and he couldn't stop doing it -- he fumbled for the place where things like this seemed to disappear to at first, when they'd found him in the landfill, but it was gone now. There was nothing left to hide it all. Was it supposed to be like this? Surely not. None of the others acted like this except Barret when he'd lost two of his friends and potentially his daughter. But Cloud hadn't lost anything -- the opposite, in fact. Maybe this was who he really was, which was why no one had wanted him before, and now that he was himself again they'd realise they didn't like him and they'd leave --

"H-how do I s-stop?" he choked out. It was nigh-unintelligible, and Yuffie did not take her hand away, and Tifa did not let go. His tears kept soaking into the pants he was wearing -- and he remembered, clothes could be taken away, too, and for one wild moment he expected them to withdraw their hands and demand he remove them and lock him in his cell, and he flinched in anticipation of a blow that never came, and he should have damn well realised it wasn't going to come in the first place.

This was pathetic. _He_ was pathetic. It was for the best this had been buried away, and if this was who he was -- this wasn't acceptable. This wasn't the sort of person they deserved to be rewarded with after going to the trouble of finding him.

Even if they weren't the sort of people to enforce it... all of this; food, a name, touch, clothes -- they were all privileges. And his second day conscious since realising this, he was already actually, honestly _crying_ , and doing a million things besides that should have gotten those privileges revoked. And he couldn't stop.

And they were still touching him. They stayed there, minute after minute, as he continued to humiliate himself in front of a crowd -- a growing crowd, Nanaki had come in at some point and had clambered onto the counter as well, Cloud's fingers working themselves through his mane, marvelling at how soft the fur behind his ears was -- and as much as he hated it, he couldn't have made himself tell them to stop in a million years.

"Y'know," said Tifa, after a moment. "I was going to kill you, at first. When I found you in the landfill."

He wanted to pick another hole into his wrist -- wanted to dig his fingers into his arm and tear at his skin, but she wouldn't let go of his hand, rubbing small circles on it with her thumb.

"Yeah?"

She nodded. "...It was the eyes," she admitted. "Everyone had heard the rumours, and I thought..." she sighed. "Before you showed up, there was this girl I'd been dating. We went about five months, and... she was really sweet, and thoughtful, and I thought maybe things were gonna get serious. But... we had our disagreements, too. Some were worse than others.

"She was a Shinra apologist. Everything got worse and worse, and no matter how bad it all got, she was sure the company was doing what was right for the city. How it made jobs, and provided cheap energy, and how Wutai had refused their offer at peaceful negotiations. She didn't want to hear anything to the contrary." Cloud's other hand had gone mostly still, a couple fingers idly scratching behind Nanaki's ear as he listened. "I thought... well, by that point I'd been hosting Avalanche for a while. If we were serious about things, she'd find out eventually. So, I figured I'd start small. I told her about Nibelheim. I told her about the -- about what happened in the reactor, and the things in the pods, and with Papa, and the whole town. What I remembered of it, anyway. She'd always wondered, about..."

Cloud's eyes flickered to her collarbone for an instant, where a long, knotted pink line streaked its way up onto her neck, a hair to the left of her carotid. It figured he hadn't even bothered to master the one spell that could have helped her -- helped Ma.

"She lost it. Called me a liar, said Sephiroth had been a hero to the people of Midgar, asked me what she was supposed to do about some town I probably wasn't even from, that she was tired of me making everything political... we didn't see each other after that. The gods only know what she would've done if I'd gone any further, probably asked the MPAF permission to participate in my execution herself."

He looked up again to see her staring at him. He swallowed.

"And then a couple months later, you showed up in that uniform, with those eyes," she continued. "Sephiroth was half-right. I wasn't going to kill you because I didn't think it was you. I was going to kill you because I did. You'd gone off and left us all, and here you were -- the only piece of Nibelheim that didn't burn up with the rest of it, throwing your lot in with the people that did it." She frowned. "And I thought -- I thought for sure, if there was ever a time to do it, it'd be now. I didn't know if I could take on a Soldier First, and you were -- you were really sick. I don't know how many days you were lying there, but you were barely breathing. I thought, if I just -- if I just tipped you over face down in the mud and walked away and let you drown in the rain, no one would even know it had been a murder. If you had time to get up, I might not get another chance."

She shook her head. "...You were so thin, though, and then I saw the scars and the... the number. And I thought, maybe -- maybe there was a reason you were here, instead of off in some penthouse somewhere. And... and it wasn't fair. That I'd finally find another survivor after all those years, when I thought I was the only one, just to lose them again. And -- I know you don't really remember, but I swear you looked right at me. Or... maybe I just imagined you did.

"And then a week later, you finally woke up, and you started talking about Nibelheim too, and things got... complicated." Cloud grimaced, and Tifa gave his hand another squeeze. "And you were horrible, and arrogant, and -- and nothing like the Cloud I knew back then, except that you were afraid of... something. And you bit me, once, on the way back," she added with a small smile. "You were way out of it, so it didn't do any real damage. Hurt like hell, though."

"I'm sorry," he croaked. It was all he could say, and it still didn't even come close.

"Well, we're even, 'cause it made me drop you twenty feet climbing over a Sector 1 maintenance tunnel," said Tifa. "Barret never let me hear the end of it. Walking into the bar with some dying Soldier First instead of supplies, and not finishing the job, then having him walk around like he owned the place. And even back then I wondered how we were 'childhood friends' if that was the kind of person you were. I guess now we know the answer to that, though..." she added, mostly to herself.

Tifa still hadn't let go of his hand, or raised her voice, or done anything but allow the calluses on her thumb to rub against one of the discoloured, hardened burn scars on his hand, from when he'd failed to reach Ma in time before succumbing to the smoke and had to be dragged out by Tifa's sensei. Nanaki's head in his lap was a warm, comforting weight, the ears brushing against his fingers as they flicked occasionally velvet soft. Yuffie had graduated from rubbing his back to leaning against him with her arm over her shoulder, snacking on one of the rolls, quiet for longer than he'd ever seen her before.

He managed to find his voice eventually. "So then... why did you let me stay? Why did -- why are you..."

"Because you changed," said Tifa simply. "Because you could change in the first place. And no matter what you think... you did that all by yourself."

After a moment, Cloud reluctantly forced himself to stop scratching Nanaki's ear, earning him an irritated huff in response, and Tifa let go of him to allow him to wipe the tears from his eyes and open another roll for himself. He could definitely see how a fresh-baked version of this had been his favourite. Even these ones were pretty good.

He still couldn't remember ever eating them in Nibelheim. He probably never would -- there was a lot of brain damage, the doctors in Mideel had said. He was a medical anomaly, walking around in spite of his actual, quantifiable brain death. It was a wonder he'd even managed to remember Tifa.

That was alright. He doubted he'd forget eating this one.

**Author's Note:**

> HEY IF YOU LIKED THIS GO READ THE NUMBER I THERE'S A LOT OF THIS TYPE OF SHIT IN IT THANKS < /shameless self-promotion>


End file.
